


Hostile One and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Prey

by lunaTactics



Category: The Murderbot Diaries - Martha Wells
Genre: Alien POV, Gen, POV First Person, POV Outsider
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-16
Updated: 2021-03-16
Packaged: 2021-03-23 00:21:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 329
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30047037
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lunaTactics/pseuds/lunaTactics
Summary: This divot in the dirt is where my burrow closes against the light and air. It opens when it is time to eat, which is soon because the walkers come closer, come closer to the edge.The opening scene fromAll Systems Redwhere Murderbot rescues hapless scientists Bharadwaj and Volescu from a worm alien, but from the worm alien's perspective.
Comments: 14
Kudos: 41





	Hostile One and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Prey

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this short ficlet a few months ago, when I noticed that the parent tag for Combat SecUnit was "Hostile One." I mean... that's not wrong, but the worm-thing from ASR is also Hostile One, and unlike CSU has no other name. What if someone wanted to write about the giant worm alien?? So of course I went and wrote it.

I am waiting for the tip-tap of the flyers' feet. Deep in my burrow I am still, so that I know when it is time to eat.

I am very hungry. It will be time to eat soon. 

Thunk-thonk. A different soundfeel, but it is still feet and I am hungry. Come closer, walker, so I may feel you better. 

This divot in the dirt is where my burrow closes against the light and air. It opens when it is time to eat, which is soon because the walkers come closer, come closer to the edge. 

Two. Close enough to snatch, swallow. 

From earth and still darkness, I burst forth, mouth agape, and grab the nearest. 

Then, a strange thing: the thunk-thonk of feet and another leaps into my mouth cavity. I like food, so I will not wonder where did this other walker come from? 

But amongst my tooth-hairs: blinding pain! And stymied loss as my meal is torn from my grip. Empty in my mouth, empty in my gullet, I must withdraw. It is not the time to eat.

For some time, only the pain and the hunger linger with me in the darkness, until they fade to dull aches. Then, outside my burrow, just barely outside the radius of my reach, comes the knowledge of weight.

It is a great weight, though distant. Do I dare? 

No need for thought. I am already lunging, stretching the suppurating length of my body up the divot of my burrow, up up up- 

Dry air blasting across the inside of my maw. My jaws close on something hard, crumpling between my teeth, and I retreat into my burrow. Then, the great weight takes flight as the little flyers do.

I crunch the hard flat thing for a long time, but there is nothing good to eat in it.

CLANG. I spit it out of my burrow. It flies away like all my other food.

These walkers leave me hungry.


End file.
